Getting shrunk

So they send you to see a councillor, which is a good thing really.
It seems so strange that any old nutter can have a baby naturally, you must see a councillor once if you do it by donation, and if you adopt they come and virtually move in with you before you pass the screening process.
At first I was irritated, thinking that there couldn't possibly be anything that they could throw at me that I hadn't already considered at length. Actually this transpired to be true, but I like the lady alot and what I walked away with was the feeling that what I was doing was 100% right and not only I thought it, but a complete outsider, and one that deals with this on a daily basis, felt the same way too. That's nice feeling because, as we all know, our friends tend to be on our side by default, and if you are the persuasive character that I can be, there's always the nagging feeling that I have conned myself and my pals into believing that this a great idea when in fact there's a good reason it hasn't happened for me.
Yes, I know, that's the negative head talking but we all have one.
She gave me lots of info about support groups which I may or may not attend, I'm a little anti the whole sit in a circle and discuss our problems vibe, but maybe I should be more open minded. I can't imagine wanting to do that when I have a small handful of friends that I trust with my life and know me inside out.
Never say never.
So that's me to date. I have a pre appointment early Sept and I guess the ball rolls in Oct.
For now all's for me to do is enjoy the summer of freedom, tough........

When will this plane ever take off ?

Patience is a virtue, so they say. Grrrrr, is what I say.
I keep telling myself this is good training for being a mum.
I cannot afford to do this privately, nor do I want to, but sadly the down side to the NHS is everything takes an achingly long time.
Having made it to the peak of difficult decisions, I just want to run down the other side and I'm having to inch it all the way. Every step takes 2 months and just when you think you've made it, there's another step (I encountered one today, hence this outburst).
It's an emotional roller coaster already and I haven't even started!
These are the times when I feel alone, and this is a feeling I'd better get used to, let's face it, what kind of guy's going to take on a pregnant lady or one with a tiny baby??
An amazing one, I guess.

p.s note to self: calm down - enjoy the freedom - it wont always be like this - oh and the sun - step away from the computer and enjoy that too.....

Finding my donor

I discovered that if you use a UK donor you know nothing about them, you get what you get, something about 'designer babies'. To me this is insanity, I would chose things in my partner so why shouldn't I have some choices concerning the father of my child.

I must admit my searches weren't exhaustive. I have a balanced belief in both destiny and also in my powers to alter it. So once I found a site that worked for me I zoned in on a donor that met most of my criteria. I wanted someone dark like me, also I find dark men attractive. I wanted someone tall as all my family are tall. I wanted someone smart and with a sense of humour (obviously!). The man I chose seamed to have all of these things, I instantly warmed to him when I heard his voice, I liked his attitude to what he was doing, and most importantly for me, he was really into being contacted by his biological children. He is an 'open donor' which means when my kid reaches 18 he/she may contact him if they want, I feel this is a basic right and it was one of the most important of my requirements.
There were lots of other considerations but essentially they were all superficial as I have never seen or touched this person, and probably never will.
I have a 30 minute recorded interview, what he choses to write about himself, and a baby photograph to go on. But in a strange way I feel I have a sense of this man, or maybe I want to feel that way.

Eventually I bought the sperm in Denmark on the Internet, after many phone calls with the sperm bank who were incredibly helpful and gentle. It was exactly the same process as buying a book on Amazon, the same shopping cart icon and the same check out.
Yes, it was weird, way up there in my weird hall of fame.

In the UK we have a law that a donor may only have 10 families. This has to be recorded and monitored so you have to buy a 'pregnancy slot', a one off fee which costs about £1000, on top of the shipping fee and £250 per unit of sperm.
Had I gone to Spain or Denmark it would have been half the price, but given that they say I have a 15% chance of success each attempt hence I may have to try a few times before I get lucky, I felt being at home was more important.

That kinda brings things up to date.
It feels so compact on this blog, infact it's been months of moral questioning and internal battles. Many heated discussions with friends and I've had to fight my corner on more than one occassion (my GP was very unhappy about it).

But ultimately I'm sure of one thing - I want a child.
I tried exceptionally hard to come to peace with the idea that it's not my path to be a mother and I failed dismally.
I do not want to look back and think I didn't at least try.

How I got here.

It's hard to know where to start.
I suppose the beginning would be a good place.

I'm 38 years old, soon to be 39.

I have been single for 2 years, after ending a relatively happy 8-year relationship with man who promised me that we would have babies 'one day'. I had been very clear about the fact I wanted children when we were falling in love, I was in my late 20's and starting to consider these things. He, being 3 years my junior, wanted to wait. I accepted that. And I waited. But 7 years later when nothing changed I began to grow suspicious. After another 2 years of an agonizing separation process I found myself 37, pissed off and single.

I have just put into a paragraph the most horrendous experience of my life, one that nearly floored me, dragging myself through month after month in a world without hope. For a long time my anger was aimed at him, 'How could he do this to me when we had an agreement?’ He stole my best childbearing years and the most painful part was he didn't even understand the tragedy that had just dripped off him like an unconscious bead of sweat. He just moved swiftly on to his next lady, telling me he how much he loved me and how sorry he felt about the unfortunate situation he had left me in. The worst pain I felt was the aloneness, the aloneness of realizing that as much as he cared (aka guilt) and as much as your friends rally round and love you (and mine really did that, they really did) this is the crappiest thing that has ever happened to me and I didn't deserve it, and whilst I was completely justified in my feelings that a great injustice had occurred, at the end of the day it's just shit, and it's my shit and no one else can make it better.

So here's the bit when I get a bit cross with myself for ending up here and then fast forward to the bit where I take some responsibility for myself.

At this point I have to credit my sister with something.
Christmas present 2007, a book called ' Knock yourself up'.
She gave it to me concerned that she may be offending me (the sub text being, you are getting on and clearly not managing to find another boyfriend, so how about considering 'plan b') but she cunningly covered her tracks by buying herself a copy as well. How she pulled that one off, given that she is happily married to a man desperate to have kids, is a credit to her.
I read a couple of chapters, wanted to vomit, had a sleepless night, cried and bit and gave the book away in disgust.

But the seed was sown.
And I didn't even know it.

A couple of months later, I tell myself that I just want a fertility MOT, I want to be in good shape when I meet the father of my child at one of the many awful parties that I now feel I have to drag myself to, just incase I meet 'the one'.
Nowdays when I have one of the very rare flashes of anger that I sometimes have aimed at my x, they are always prompted by leaving some dreadful event I would never have gone to had I not been single. A mixture of the mild disappointment at leaving yet another party, having fancied no one, and also of realizing it was written like a book before you left your cosy home a few hours prior.
It's humiliating.

So my fertility tests all come back positive.
Now what?

My doctor says that he's pleased to see a woman of my age, that all too often single women don't start to worry about these issues until their early 40's, by which time it's so much harder to help them.
I explain that I only want to know I'm in 'good working order'.

But now the seed has sprouted.

I'm asking myself why would I wait until I'm 40+ (and let's face it a year goes mightily quick) and it's harder to conceive?
I started to look at sperm donor sites and softly, softly, gently, gently the concept sunk into my soul.

In fact it was a quick transition and a wonderful one.
The hardest part was letting go of the romantic dream, but reality once faced is so much less scary.
(How I wish I could remember that).
And what arrived in its place was beautiful.
For the first time in years I took hold of the reins and I was in charge of my happiness.
If what I want is a baby then I can try for one. I don't have to be looking for the father of my child in a desperate way, a way in which I'd surely accept less then I should.

At this point I want to express that I am the product of a single parent upbringing, unusually it was my father that parented me. He did a good, solid job but I suffered greatly.
I don't take lightly the decision to have a child alone.
I realise that it is selfish but I think I will be a good mother.
I have a solid support system of friends and I am financially independent.
I truly believe that I will one day meet a great man and fall in love but it may not be in time for me to have a baby, and I'm not prepared to sacrifice myself to the universe in that way. So I'm making the informed, and very considered, act of trying for a baby alone, by donor insemination.
And I’m really excited about it.